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A HISTORICAL LECTURE , BY 

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I BET. ABRAHAM SYLVESTER' GABDIMER, A. H., : 

PASTOR OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 

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MILFORD, PIKE CO., PA. 

3 DELIVERED O? THE 22 OF FEBRUARY IN VARIOUS PLACES » 
THROUGH SUCCESSIVE YEARS. 

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■• Where may tlie weaiiod eye n , 

When gazing on the Great- 
win re neither sru'lty glory glows, 

Nov despicable stale ? 

h— tli ,n'st— tin- last— the best- 
Tin' Cineinna^us of the W 
Whom envy dared not li ite, 

then the name of Washington 
o make turn blusl there was but one ! '— BYRON. 



1886. 



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„^US ACTA P Ho ^__ 

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-THE- 

-: REVOLUTION, WASHINGTON :- 

AND THE 

CONSTITUTION: 

A HISTORICAL LECTURE, BY 

REV. ABRAHAM SYLVESTER GARDINER, A. I, 

PASTOR OF THE FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, 

MILFORD, PIKE CO., PA. 

DELIVERED ON THE 22 OF FEBRUARY. IX VARIOUS PLACES 
THROUGH SUCCESSIVE YEARS. 






'• Where may the wearied eve repose 

When gazing on the GreaV- 
Wliere neither guilty glory glows, q, ^ -, . 

Nor despicable state ? 
res— one— the first— the last—the best— 
The Clnclnnatns of the West, 

Whom envy dared not hate. 

Bequeathed the name of Washington 

To make nun blush there was but one '."— Byrox. v\. 



1886. 



Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1886 bj 

KEV. ABRAHAM SYLVESTER CARDIAL 

111 the ^ce of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. 



PSION PKIJTT, PORT JEBTIS, N. y. 












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DEDICATION. 

TO THE MEMORY OF OUR BELOVED DAUGHTER, 

JULIA EVANGELINE GARDINER, 

Who, with lamp trimmed and burning, heard the midnight cry, "Behold, 
the Bridegroom cometh!" and, being ready, "went in with Him to 
the marriage," Sabbath morning, August 26lh, 1882, at the early age 
of twenty-two years and ten months : a student at Wellesley 
College, Massachusetts, in 1877-8, and one of the two first 
Degree-Graduates of Rockford Female College, Rock- 
ford, Illinois, in 1882: at whose instance this Lecture 
was delivered, February 22nd, of the same 
year, before the Senior Class, at that time 
engaged in the study of the 

CONSTITUTION OF the UNITED STATES, 

Of which class she was a member.- and whose name I wish to be associated 

with my own so long as any act of my life, and any utterances 

of my tongue or pen, shall be held in friendly remembrance — 

THIS LECTURE IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED 

)'»Y HER BEREAVED FATHER. 

•'(,ii. Gentle Spirit, to thy destined rest : 

While [,— reversed our Nature's kindlier doom,— 

Pour forth a Father's sorrow on thy tomb." 

ALSO 

TO THE YOUNG MEN AND YOUNG WOMEN OF AMERICA, 
To whom has been bequeathed the noble heritage of 

A FREE REPUBLIC; 

Who will be eager to learn its history, and to examine the solid founda- 
tions on which it rests: and who, estimating its value by what it 
cost, will be inspired to transmit it unimpaired to their posterity, 

This Lecture is Respectfully Inscribed 

by their fellow-countryman, 

ABRAHAM S.GARDINER. 



Milford, Pa . Feb. 22nd, L886. 



LECTURE. 



Ladies and Gentlemen : I propose to speak to you to-night 
upon the Revolution, Washington, and the Constitution. The 
day we celebrate suggests the theme. This is the Anni- 
versary of Washington's birth. These topics are so closely asso- 
ciated that they can scarcely be severed. Yet neither together ,nor 
singly, can they be fully considered within the limits of a lecture. 
While it would be eminently proper to retrace the remarkable 
events which distinguished the career of Washington, and to 
reproduce the life that rendered his country and age illustrious, 
and while it would not be less appropriate to recount the marches, 
privations, and battles of the Revolution,we shall call your atten- 
tion chiefly to the great result which has come to us in the Con- 
stitution of the United States. The monument to the memory 
of Washington, just completed and dedicated in the city which 
bears his name, the capitol of the Republic, towers above St. 
Peter's at Rome, above the pyramids of Egypt, and above every 
structure hitherto erected by human hands. In like manner 
does the Constitution, suggested by Washington, drawn up in the 
Convention of which he was President and transmitted by him 
with his signature to the Continental Congress, accompanied by 
an earnest letter commending it for adoption by the Confederated 
States, rise above all the forms of government that have hitherto 
appeared in the annals of history. 

In the review which is to be taken by us this evening we shall 
see that the work of W ashington and his associates could scarcely 
have been accomplished at an earlier period. The way had to be 
prepared. Innumerable agencies, operating through long periods 
and in many lands, must precede so desirable a consummation. 

In nothing is this more perceptible than, in that climax of 
political wisdom to which we have just referred, and which, in its 



2 



historical relations, and in honor of the day we celebrate, we now 
proceed to consider. 

As already intimated, a complete study of the Constitution of 
the United States demands the consideration of times, persons 
and influences which are quite distinct and indeed remote from 
those immediately connected with its formation. Its origin can- 
not be found in any one mind, language, country, or period. It 
is the fruit of a tree whose roots penetrate the recesses of the 
past. It is the result of a series of events whose bearings and im- 
portance were not fully known, even to those by whom they were 
suece.-sivelv achieved. These men, with all their devotion and 
hopes, built more wisely than they knew. The "Republic" of 
Plato, the glowing speculations of Cicero, among the ancients ; 
the "Utopia" of Sir Thomas Moore; the "Arcadia" of Sidney . 
the political disquisitions of Milton and of Locke, in modern times; 
disclose rather what these writers wished than what they ex- 
pected. But their influence has survived them in these imperish- 
able works, and has been a powerful factor in the progress of 
men on the line of intellectual, moral and political development. 
They saw through a glass darkly what we behold face to face. 

The historical sources and accompaniments of the National 
Constitution, and not the Constitution itself, now claim our 
attention. Not to go further back into the past, we may 
say, that the period extending from the year 1300 to the year 
1550, was of the first importance to invention, to maritime enter- 
prise, and to the achievement of civil and religious freedom. 
The leading events of this period, were the introduction into 
general use of the Mariner's Compass, the invention of gun- 
powder and guns and of the art of Printing, the Discovery of 
America, and the Reformation. 

The reports which came from the New World, at the close of 
the 15th century, stimulated to the last degree the spirit of adven- 
ture. The Spaniards were transported with glowing hopes, 
kindled by the adventures of De Soto, and the reports made by 
Sir Walter Raleigh to his countrymen in England, aroused 
amongst them a corresponding enthusiasm. Withrespect to an ex- 
pedition led by De Soto, the distinguished companion of Pizzaro, 
it is said, that "as soon as the news of its design was 
published in Spain the wildest hopes were indulged. Adven- 
turers assembled as volunteers, many of them people of good 
estates and noble birth. Houses and vineyards, land.- for tillage. 
and rows of olive trees, were sold.as in the times of the Crusades, 



to obtain the means of military equipment. The port whence 
the expedition was to set sail was crowded with people anxious 
to join in the enterprise." * 

Those who in England had taken part in the expedition under 
Raleigh, were captivated by the scenes which they visited. Sail- 
ing leisurely along the shores of North Carolina, they imagined 
themselves within the precincts of another Eden. "The sea was 
tranquil ; the skies were clear ; no storms were gathering ; the 
air was agitated by none but the gentlest breezes, and all were 
in raptures with the beauty of the ocean seen in the magnificence 
of repose. Islands gemmed its surface, and it extended in the 
clearest transparency from cape to cape. The vegetation of 
that southern latitude struck the beholders with admiration. 
The trees were without their equals in the world. The luxuriant 
vines as they clambered up the loftiest cedars formed graceful 
festoons. Grapes were so plenty on every little shrub, that the 
waves of the ocean, as it lazily rolled in upon the shore with the 
quiet winds of summer, dashed its spray upon the clusters, and 
natural arbors formed an impervious shade which not a ray of 
the suns of duly could penetrate. As they drew near to land, 
the fragrance was as if they had been in the midst of a most 
delicate garden abounding with all kinds of odoriferous 
flowers." | 

With such impressions, and such reports, widely diffused, it is 
not wonderful that emigration from the shores of Europe was 
prompt and rapid. Nor need it hardly be said that the settle- 
ment of the New World by Europeans was attended by the 
characteristics of European civilization. At this period that 
civilization had assumed a definite outline. The emigration of 
Goth, Vandal, Hun, Frank and Burgundian, had ceased, and the 
intruders had become incorporated with the nations of Western 
Europe which they had invaded. 

The feudal system had begun to yield to the claims of the age 
winch called loudly for a recognition of the rights of the common 
people. The mutual efforts of the state and church to uphold 
each other's authority, were at this period met with a wider and 
sterner resistance than had marked the history of Europe for a 
thousand years. 

This, too, was the era of the Reformation. The church in 
(Treat Britain was revolutionized. Henry VIII. assumed supreme 
authority in both church and state. Interrupted in the reign of 



• Bancroft's J I £ — t 

i I ■ 1 1 -i j i 



Mary, it was resumed in that of Elizabeth The development of 
events in the direction of civil freedom now became rapid, con- 
stituted in the language of the time a New Departure. But the 
struggle was great and protracted. Elizabeth and lier successor, 
tlanies I., were bent upon uniformity in worship among all 
their subjects. Non-conformists incurred the royal displeasure. 
Among these noble assertors and defenders of human rights 
were the "Pilgrim Fathers." Driven by persecution in the reign 
of James I., they sought a transient refuge in Holland, and 
afterwards resuming the march of their exile, turned their faces 
towards the New World, and on the 22nd December, 1620, two 
hundred and sixty-five years ago, planted their feet upon 
Plymouth Rock. Amid ice and snow they knelt upon the shore, 
and with prayers and tears, consecrated the land before them to 
the enjoyment of civil and religious freedom. 

While this scene was being enacted upon the coast of New 
England, another, of scarcely less importance, was opening upon 
the banks of James River, in the Colony of Virginia. In the 
year 1619 the first Colonial Assembly that ever met upon this 
continent was convened at Jamestown. It was composed of a 
Governor, a newly appointed Council, and two Representatives of 
the eleven burroughs of the colony. Two years after the conven- 
tion of this assembly, a memorable ordinance of the London 
Company gave to Virginia a written, constitution, by which a 
system of representative government and trial by jury was estab- 
lished as an acknowledged right. In this memorable document, 
as in that drawn up in the cabin of the Mayflower, Ave discover 
the germs of the Constitution of the United States. 

From the year 1625 to 1674, the colonies under their re- 
spective governments, whether Provincial, as was the form under 
which were included the colonies of New Hampshire, New York, 
Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, or Pro- 
prietary, as was that of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Delaware, 
or Charter, the government of Massachusetts, Rhode Island and 
Connecticut, enjoyed greater liberty and tranquility than their 
countrymen in England. 

During this period which extended from the accession of 
Charles 1., to near the close of the reign of Charles II., Ena-land 
was in a state of continual agitation. The bigoted views of 
James I., and of his son were not congenial to the spirit of the 
British Constitution and the rising spirit of the British nation. 
When therefore Charles attempted a positive invasion of the 



rights of his subjects,hemet with unexpected and determined resist- 
ance. The intelligence and power of the Third Estate, as the 
people were sometimes called, were far greater then than at any 
previous period of English history. 

The House of Commons, once so impotent and unpopular, had 
become the right arm of the state. The power to originate 
money hills to meet the expenses of the government, was lodged 
exclusively with this branch of Parliament. The exercise of 
arbitrary power attempted by the King was stoutly resisted by 
these representatives of the people. The King would accept 
nothing the Commons were willing; to grant. Thus we are in- 
troduced to perhaps the most interesting period in British annals; 
to one of the epochs of modern history. 

Peaceful measures having failed, the King grasped the sword. 
This act was promptly and resolutely answered by the Commons 
and people. In the ensuing conflict the power of the King, once 
deemed invulnerable, was broken. The scaffold and block, so 
often reddened with blood spilt in the cause of liberty, now blushed 
with the blood of a martyr to tyranny. 

The reign of Charles I. was followed by the energetic and 
generally benignant protectorate of Cromwell, and this was suc- 
ceeded by the restoration of the Stewarts in the person of 
Charles II. 

We are now brought to a period of special significance to our- 
selves. It was during the reign of Charles II. that the British 
Parliament took the tirst step which on the part of the mother 
country injuriously affected the American colonies. 

At this period an act of Parliament was passed prefaced by the 
following preamble : " Whereas, it is just and necessary that a 
revenue be raised in America for defraying the expenses of de- 
fending, protecting and securing the same." The act then pro- 
ceeds to lay a duty on clayed-sugar, indigo, coffee, silk, molasses, 
calicoes, &c, being the produce of a colony, not under the 
dominion <>t his Majesty. To this exercise of power on the part 
of Parliament the colonists submitted, but not without complaint 
and remonstrance. The subject of taxing the American colonies 
had indeed been agitated before this time. But this was the first 
actual attempt to enforce that policy. 

Referring to this action on the part of Parliament and the colo- 
nies, Charles Fox, the celebrated British orator and statesman, says: 
"There is something curious in discovering that even at this 
early period (1685) a question relative to North American liberty, 



6 



and even to North American taxation, was considered as the test of 
principles friendly or adverse to arbitrary power at home. But 
the truth is, that among the several controversies which have 
arisen, there is no other where the natural rights of man on the 
one hand and the authority of artificial institutions on the other, 
as applied respectively by the Whigs and Tories to the English 
constitution, are so fairly put in issue, nor by which the line of 
separation between the two parties, is so strongly and distinctly 
marked." 

Charles II. was succeeded by his brother James II. Blind 
or indifferent to the intelligence and spirit of the English people, 
James by still more arbitrary acts increased their exasperation, 
"lie suspended the exercise of the Protestant religion, acknowl- 
edged the supremacy of the Pope, and allowed the Jesuits again 
to establish themselves in the kingdom." 

The thoughts of his subjects at this moment were similar to 
those expressed by Archibald Rowan at his celebrated trial in 
Ireland in 179-1. "I did imagine," said he on that stirring occa- 
sion, "that the British Constitution was a representative legisla- 
ture ; that the people were represented by the House of Com- 
mons ; that the Lords - represented the territory, the property ; 
and that the King represented the state ; the power of the whole 
placed in his hands for the benefit of the whole. As a person, 
as a man, I know nothing of the King. I can know nothing of 
him except as wielding the force of the nation, and if ever that 
force should be misapplied or abused, it then remains for the 
people to decide in what hands it ought to be placed." 

Such were the views of the English people more than a 
century before. And these views were urged with such vigor 
that James II. was forced to abdicate his throne. This abdica- 
tion and the accession of William of Orange, with Mary, elder 
daughter and heiress of James, accomplished the Revolution of 
1688. As an expression of the mind of the people and of the 
new rulers whom they had chosen, a Bill of Bights was adopted, 
containing the following provisions : 

1. The pretended power of suspending laws, or the execution 
of laws by regal authority without the consent of Parliament, is 
illegal. 

2. That the pretended power of dispensing with laws, or the 
execution of laws by regal authority as it hath been assumed 
and exercised of late, is illegal. 

3. That the commission for erecting the late Court of Com- 



missioners for ecclesiastical causes, and all other commissions and 
courts of like nature, are illegal and pernicious. 

4. That levying money for or to the use of the Crown by 
pretense of prerogative, without grant of Parliament, for longer 
time, or in all other manner than the same is and shall be 
granted, is illegal. 

5. That it is the right of the subject to petition the King, 
and that all commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning 
are illegal. 

6. That the raising or keeping a standing army within the 
kingdom in time of peace, unless it be with the consent of Par- 
liament, is against law. 

7. That the subjects, who are Protestants, may have arms 
for their defense, suitable to their conditions, and as allowed by 
law. 

8. That elections of members of Parliament ought to be free. 

9. That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in 
Parliament ought not to be impeached in any court or place out 
of Parliament. 

10. That excessive bail ought not to be required ; nor exces- 
sive fines imposed ; nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. 

11. That Jurors ought to be duly impannelled and returned ; 
and that Jurors who pass upon persons in trials, for high treason, 
ought to be freeholders. 

12. That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of 
particular persons before conviction, are illegal and void. 

13. And that for the redress of all grievances, and for the 
amending, strengthening and preserving of laws, Parliament 
ought to be frequently held. 

Smm was the Bill of Eights of the Revolution of 1688. You 
will readily perceive its importance. It gave the unwritten 
laws of England a definite form and character. The rights of 
King, Parliament, and people, were brought out from the dim 
obscurity and uncertainty of the common law, which was com- 
prised of customs, prescriptions, reports, statutes and traditions. 

While, however, the Revolution of 1688 achieved much, it 
fell short of securing to British subjects the full measure of 
national freedom. "The Great Charter of King John and the 
Bill of Rights," says Dr. Parley, "were wise and strenuous 
efforts to obtain security against certain abuses of regal power 
by which the subject had been formerly aggrieved ; but these 



were, either of them, much too partial modifications of the con- 
stitution to give it a new original/' 

The progress of liberty was not to stop with this triumph. 
Its advance, however, was promoted by means at that time little 
anticipated. While far away over the Atlantic the Colonies 
watched with interest the revolutionary movements in England, 
and were animated with an intelligent love of the more liberal 
features of the British Constitution, which the seventeenth and 
eighteenth centuries had developed ; they found themselves called 
upon to defend the political principles thus established, and to 
give them a wider application than either the King, or Parlia- 
ment, or the British people had suspected. 

In the year 1765 an attempt was made by the home govern- 
ment, ''practically to exert over the colonies the power of in- 
ternal legislation and taxation." 

This assumption of legislative power was promptly resisted. 
The grounds of resistance were the same in all the colonies. 
Notwithstanding the differences in their original and actual 
political organization, "whether charter, provincial, or pro- 
prietary," the Colonies, at the time of the American Revolution, 
enjoj'ed, in most respects, the same general rights and privileges. 
In all of them there existed a governor, a council and a repre- 
sentative assembly, composed of delegates chosen by the people, 
by whom the legislative and executive functions were exercised 
according to the particular organization of the Colony. In all 
of them express provision was made that all subjects and their 
children, inhabiting in the Colonies, should be deemed natural 
born subjects, and should enjoy all the privileges and immunities 
conferred by the British Constitution upon the most favored citizens 
of the mother country. In all the Colonies, the common law of 
England, so far as it was applicable to their situation, was made 
the basis of their jurisprudence, and that law was asserted at all 
times by them to be their birth-right and inheritance. Again, 
"it was insisted that the sole claim of England to the American 
Continent being founded in the mere title of discovery, the 
Colonies brought with them, all the laws of the parent country 
which were applicable to their situation." 

That the Colonies were bound to resist the violation of the 
laws of the realm, and the spirit of the Great Charter and the 
Bill of Rights, is a truth which lies embedded in the very 
structure of government. "If public expediency be the founda- 
tion, it is also the measure of civil obedience ; the obligation of 



subjects and sovereigns is reciprocal, and the duty of allegiance, 
whether it be founded in utility or compact, is neither unlimited 
nor unconditional. Peace may be purchased too dearly. 
Patience becomes pusillanimity when it serves to increase the 
weight of our burden, or to bind it the faster. The submission 
which surrenders the liberty of a nation, and entails slavery 
Upon future generations, is enjoined by no law of national mo- 
rality. Each one should compare the peril and expense of the 
enterprise with the effects it is expected to produce and to make 
choice of the alternative by which not his own present relief or 
profit, but the whole and permanent interest of the state, is 
likely to be promoted." * 

AVe will now examine those acts of the King and Parliament 
which the Colonists considered infractions of their Constitutional 
rights, and which called forth their prompt and determined 
opposition. 

In the year 1765 Parliament imposed a duty on stamps. That 
this was a serious and questionable step, may be inferred from 
words spoken by the Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole. 
Several years before, when a similar scheme for taxing the 
colonies was proposed, he said : " I will leave that for some one 
of my successors who may have more courage than I have, and 
be less a friend to commerce than I am." 

Soon after the passage of the " Stamp Act " a colonial Con- 
gress of twenty-eight members met at New York. This assem- 
bly remonstrated against the act of Parliament and made a declar- 
ation of the rights of the colonies, declaring that taxation and 
representation were inseparable, and that Parliament had no right 
to take their money without their consent. 

That the stand taken by this assembly was correct is clear from 
the language of Dr. Paiey, at that day one of the leading writers 
in England, on the British Constitution. 

" The Constitution," he says, " provides that every district of 
the Empire shall enjoy the privilege of choosing representatives 
informed of the interests and circumstances and desires of their 
constituents, and entitled by their situation to communicate that 
information to the Xational Council. The meanest subject has 
some one whom he can call upon to bring forward his complaints 
and requests to the public attention." And on this subject of 
taxation he says : " Every law which by the remotest construc- 
tion may be deemed to levy money upon the property of the sub- 

* Pa ley. 



10 

ject, must originate, that is, must first he proposed and assented 
to in the House of Commons. By this regulation the levying of 
taxes is almost exclusively reserved to the popular part of the 
Constitution, and the House of Commons, it is presumed, 
will not tax themselves nor their fellow suhjects, without being 
first convinced of the necessity of the aids which they grant." 

We thus perceive that the British Constitution guaranteed the 
full representation of all British subjects. 

In keeping with these sentiments of Dr. Paley, was the opinion 
of Lord Chatham pronounced in Parliament just after the news 
of colonial resistance reached England: 

" You have no right to tax America. I rejoice that America 
has resisted. Three millions of our fellow subjects so lost to 
every sense of virtue, as tamely to give up their liberties, would 
be fit instruments to make slaves of the rest." 

The obnoxious " Stamp Act " was at length repealed. But 
strange to say, this was followed by other acts still more obnoxious. 
One imposed a duty upon painters 1 colors, glass, paper and tea. 
Another established at Boston a Board of Commissioners to man- 
age the revenue arising from the duties. Another to compel the 
colonists to provide for British troops, and to support them at 
their own expense. 

These several acts awakened among the colonists increased ex- 
citement and resistance. Yet all this, instead of producing 
moderation in parliamentary proceedings, had a contrary effect. 
" A bill was speedily passed by which the port of Boston was 
precluded the privilege of landing and discharging, or of lading 
and shipping wares and merchandise." 

Another bill was passed essentially altering the charter of the 
province of Massachusetts, making the appointment of the 
Council, justices, judges, sheriffs, or other officers, dependent on 
the Crown, or its immediate agent. 

Another act directed the Governor to send to another colony, 
or to Great Britain, for trial, any person indicted for murder or 
any other capital offence. 

The news of these proceedings went through the land as on 
the wings of the wind. 

The time for action had now arrived. The people resolved to 
assemble for consultation. Eleven of the colonies appointed 
deputies for this purpose. On the -fth of September, 1774, these 
deputies met at Philadelphia, and there organized under the name 
of"" The Continental Congress." 



11 



The proceedings of this celebrated assembly were attended 
with the most mature deliberation. The responsibility they as- 
sumed was of the gravest character. 

To meet the legislation of Parliament, " a non-importation and 
non-consumption agreement " was made. An address was issued 
to the inhabitants of British America, and another to the people 
of Great Britain. They also drew up and unanimously adopted 
a Declaration of Bights substantially as follows : 

1. That we are entitled to life, liberty and property, and have 
never ceded to any sovereign power whatever a right to dispose 
of either without our consent. 

2. That our ancestors who first settled these colonies were at 
the time of their emigration from the mother country entitled to 
all the rights, liberties and immunities of free and natural born 
subjects within the realm of England. 

3. That by such emigration they by no means forfeited, sur- 
rendered or lost any of their rights ; but they were, and their 
descendants now are, entitled to the exercise and enjoyment of 
all such of them as their local and other circumstances enable 
them to exercise and enjoy. 

4. That the foundation of English liberty and of all free gov- 
ernment is a right in the people to participate in their Legislative 
Council. And as the English colonists are not represented, and 
from their local and other circumstances, cannot properly be rep- 
resented in the British Parliament, they are entitled to a free and 
exclusive power of legislation in their several provincial Legisla- 
tures, where the right of representation can alone be preserved in all 
cases of taxation and internal polity, subject only to the negative of 
their Sovereign in such manner as has heretofore been used and 
accustomed. But from the necessity of the case and a regard to 
the mutual interests of both countries, we cheerfully consent to 
the operation of such acts of the British Parliament as are, in 
good faith, restrained to the regulation of our external commerce, 
for the purpose of securing the commercial advantages of the 
whole Empire to the mother country, and the commercial benefit 
of its respective members ; excluding every idea of taxation, in- 
ternal or external, for raising a revenue on the subjects in America 
without their consent. 

5. That the respective colonies are entitled to the common 
law of England, and especially to the great and inestimable privi- 
lege of being tried by the peers of the vicinage, according to the 
course of that law. 



12 



6. That they are entitled to the benefit of such of the Eng- 
lish statutes us existed at the time of their colonization, and which 
they have by experience respectively found to be applicable to 
their several local and other circumstances. 

7. That these his Majesty's colonies are likewise entitled to 
all the immunities and privileges granted and confirmed to them 
by royal charters, or secured to them by their several codes of 
provincial law. 

8. That they have a right peaceably to assemble, consider of 
their grievances and petition the King ; and that all prosecutions, 
prohibitory proclamations and commitments for the same, are 
illegal. 

9. That the keeping a standing army in these colonies in times 
of peace without the consent of the Legislature of the Colony in 
which such an army is .kept, is against law. 

10. It is indispensibly necessary to good government, and 
rendered essential by the English Constitution, that the constitu- 
ent branches of the Legislature be independent of each other ; 
that therefore the exercise of legislative powers in several col- 
onies by a council appointed during the pleasure of the Crown, is 
unconstitutional, dangerous, and destructive to the freedom of 
American Legislation. 

Such was the Declaration of Rights made bv the Coni:rc>s 
of 1774. 

The addresses which were issued to the people of Great 
Britain, and to the inhabitants of the Province of Quebec were 
marked with the same moderation and decision. 

In the address to the people of Great Britain, after setting 
forth the distinctions in legislation made by Parliament between 
the colonies and the mother country, they add : 

"Reason looks with indignation upon such distinctions, and 
freemen can never perceive their propriety. And yet however 
chimerical and unjust such discriminations are, the Parliament 
assert that they have a right to bind us in all cases without ex- 
ception, whether we consent or not ; that they may take and 
use our property when and in what manner they please; that we 
are pensioners on their bounty for all that we possess, and can 
hold it no longer than they vouchsafe to permit. Such declara- 
tions we consider heresies in English politics, and which can no 
more operate to deprive us of our property, than the interdicts 
of the Popes can divest Kings of sceptres which the laws of the 
laud and the voice of the people have placed in their hands/' 



13 



In the address to the people of Quebec, after recounting the 
rights guaranteed by the British Constitution, they say: "these 
are the rights without which a people cannot be free and happy, 
and under the protecting and encouraging influence of which 
these Colonies have hitherto so amazingly flourished and increased. 
These are the rights which the Ministry are. now striving by 
force of arms to ravish from us, and which we are, with one 
mind, resolved never to resign but with our lives." 

Lord Chatham said,January 20th, 1775, in Parliament : " Had 
the earl) r situation of the people of Boston been attended to, 
things would not have come to this, but the infant complaints of 
Boston were literally treated like the capricious squalls of a 
child, who, it was said, did not know whether it was aggrieved 
or not. Put full well I knew, at that time, that this child, if 
not redressed, would soon assume the courage and voice of a 
man Full well I knew, that the sons of ancestors, born under 
the same free constitution, and once breathing the same liberal 
air as Englishmen, ancestors who even quitted this land of 
liberty, the moment it became a land of oppression, and, in 
resistance to bigoted councils and oppressive measures, tore 
themselves from their dearest connections ; I say, full well I 
knew, that the offspring of such ancestors would resist upon the 
same principles and on the same occasions. * * * * 

" I have crawled, m}' Lords, to this house to-day to tell you so. 
1 think it my duty to give the whole of my experience and 
council to my country at all times, but more particularly when 
she is so much in need of it ; and having thus entered upon the 
threshold of this business, I will knock at your gates for justice, 
and never stop, except infirmities should nail me to my bed, until 
I have at least tried everything in my power to heal those 
unhappy divisions. 

" There is no time to be lost — every hour is big with danger — 
perhaps, whilst I am now speaking, the decisive blow is struck, 
which may involve millions in the consequence; and, believe me, 
the very first drop of blood that is spilled will not be from a 
wound easily skimmed over, it will be irritabile vulnus ; a wound 
of that rancorous and festering kind, that, in all probability, 
will mortify the whole body. 

" Who then, in the name of heaven, could advise this measure? 
Or who can continue to give this strange and unconstitutional 
advice? If his Majesty continues to hear such counsellors, he 
will not only be badly advised, but undone. lie may wear his 



11 



,;,,,"! ' i * r" not ],e w '"'"' wearin g : '■" , ' , «<i of 
i. "i s .tVr'ff'r A " uT, r !, -, i ' , win iose its r " stre »<« »o 

m!!|,'s,v • " e <Mge>><>e winch should irradiate the brow of 

\<n^!TJZ^ lip ^ at , !' e P a P ere transmitted us from 
a-menca, when 3 ou consider their decency, firmness and wisdom 

v:.;;;;:!r t :::r? f eir -? e and wisfi to s str^s: 

«b e ' tt u "i I T a " d a ™ w ' that ' "' a " ™y readi "S «'"! 
ooseivation, and it has been my favorite study— 1 have read 

or me vroild, that for solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity 
-«1 wisdom of conclusion, under such a complication of dXent 
circumstances no nation or body of men can stand in preference 
to the general Congress at Philadelphia " pieteience 

bese addresses respectful and well founded as they were 
Produced only an exasperating effect upon the Ministry.'' Otho,- 

wl , 1,'d" h'dv , OWed ?°' l68S ob J<*«onable than t , , . 
vviut.ii naci aJieadv been passed 

The issue toward which all previous discussions and acts h-,,1 
ended was now reached. In the legislature of Virginia Pat ck 
Henry gave expression to the general feeline • « A S 1 ♦ 
nnnsand the God of battles," he excTatj,' « is ^tha^ Lft 

'Peace' P^,? M™* 9 ^ mttet - 4ntleluen "'^ 
1 eace reace . but there is no peace. The war is ar-r'nallv 

e > th, clash of resounding arms ! Our brethren arc already in 

sweet, as to be purchased at the 'price of ,l,t Z T™ S " 
Forbid ff, Almighty God ! I LlTno^Zr^Zy 

On Mav tn°H m XT% me Hbert * ° r S ive me death !" 
the nil ' f "' V 1 '■ C ° T gl ' eSS ! net a « ain at Philadelphia. On 

-fon was celebrated at Ci ^^^""T^tS 

ffc£SS£|^^ 



15 



honor to be present on the occasion and to participate in a 
banquet given in Memorial Hall by the city of Cambridge in 
commemoration of that interesting event. 

The battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill, had 
already been fought. The prediction of Patrick Henry had been 
fulfilled. 

On June 7th, 1776, Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, made a 
motion in Congress in favor of declaring the Colonies free and 
independent. In support of this motion John Adams spoke 
with even more than his wonted vehemence : 

" The war," said he, " must go on. We must tight it through. 
And if the war must go on, why put off longer the Declaration 
of Independence ? Every Colony, indeed, has expressed its 
willingness to follow, if we but take the lead. Sir, the Declar- 
ation will inspire the people with increased courage. Instead of 
a long and bloody war for restoration of privileges, for redress 
of grievances, for chartered immunities, held under a British 
King, set before them the glorious object of entire Independence 
and it will breathe into them anew the breath of life. 

" Read this Declaration at the head of the army ; every sword 
will he drawn from its scabbard, and the solemn vow uttered to 
maintain it or to perish on the bed of honor. Publish it from 
the pulpit ; religion will approve it, and the love of religions 
liberty will cling round it, resolved to stand with it or fall with 
it. Send it to the public halls ; proclaim it there ; let them hear 
it who heard the first roar of the enemy's cannon ; let them see 
it who saw their brothers and their sons fall on the field of 
Bunker Hill, and in the streets of Lexington and Concord, and 
the very walls will cry out in its support. 

'Sir, 1 know the uncertainty of human affairs, but I see, I see 
clearly, through this day's business. You and I, indeed, may rue 
it. We may not live to the time when this Declaration shall be 
made good. We may die ; die Colonists ; die slaves ; die, it may 
be, igiioininiously and on the scaffold. Be it so. Be it so. If 
it be the pleasure of heaven that my country shall require the 
poor offering of my life, the victim shall be ready at the 
appointed hour of sacrifice, come when that hour may. But 
whatever be our fate, be assured, be assured, that this Declaration 
will stand. It may cost treasure, and it may cost blood, but it 
will stand and richly compensate for both. Through the thick 
gloom of the present 1 see the brightness of the future as the 
sun in heaven. We shall make this a glorious, an immortal day. 



16 



When wo are in our graves our children will honor it. They 
will celebrate it with thanksgiving, with festivity, with bonfires 
and illuminations. 

"Sir, before God, I believe the hour is come. My judgment 
approves this measure and my whole heart is in it. All that I 
have, and all that I am, I am now ready here to stake upon it. 
And I leave off as I began, that live or die, survive or perish, I 
am for the Declaration. It is my living sentiment, and by the 
grace of God, it shall be my dying sentiment: Independence 
now and Independence forever." 

On the 4th of July, 1776, the thirteen Colonies were declared 
Free and Independent. The title assumed was, The United States 
of America. 

The Declaration of Independence contained a concise recital 
of Colonial grievances. On its adoption the bell of the Old 
State House of Philadelphia rang out the news to the thousands 
assembled in Independence Square, and to the homes of the 
Colonists in the neighborhood of the city. The news was 
received everywhere with the highest exultation. The ennobling 
prospect of ;i separate national existence animated the people 
with new courage and resolution to repel the invader. 

The war of the Revolution followed. With it came suffering 
and gloom. Truthfully did the poet Campbell sing the rise of 
American liberty : 

" Dark was the hour by stern oppression driven, 
When trans-Atlantic Liberty arose ; 

Not in the sunshine and the smile of heaven, 
But wrapped in whirlwinds and begirt with woes !" 

The climax of suffering on the part of the army seemed to be 
reached when on the 17th December, 1777, they made their 
dreary encampment at Valley Forge. The winter had set in 
with unusual severity. Hungry and cold were the poor fellows 
who had so long been keeping the field. Provisions were scant, 
clothing worn out, and so badly off were they for shoes, that the 
footsteps of many might be tracked in blood. It has been 
eloquently said that "there, in the midst of frost and snow, 
disease and destitution, Liberty erected her altar. In all the 
world's history we have no record of purer devotion, holier 
sincerity, or more heroic self sacrifice, than was exhibited in this 
camp of Washington. If there is a spot on the face of our 
broad land whereon patriotism should delight to pile its highest 
and most venerated monument, it should be in the bosom of that 



17 



little vale on the banks of the Schuylkill, amid the ' templed 
hills,' consecrated by the presence and suffering of those who 
achieved our Independence." 

"The land is holy where they fought, 

And holv where they fell ; 
For by their blood that land was bought, 

The land they loved so well. 
Then glory to that valiant band 
The honored saviors of the land ! 

< ), few and weak their numbers were — 

A handful of brave men ; 
But to their God they gave their prayer, 

And rushed to battle then. 
The God of battles heard their cry, 
And sent to them the victory. 



They left the plowshare in the mould, 

Their flocks and herds without a fold, 

The sickle in the unshorn grain, 

The corn, half garnered, on the plain, 

And mustered in their simple dress 

For wrongs to seek a stern redress, 

To right those wrongs, come weal, come woe, 

To perish or o'ercome their foe. 



And where are ye, oh, fearless men? 

And where are ye to-day ? 
I call :— the hills reply again, 

That ye have passed away ; 
That on old Bunker's lonely height, 

In Trenton and on Monmouth ground, 
The grass grows green, the harvest light. 

Above each soldier's mound. 

The bugle's mild and warlike blast 

Shall muster them no more ; 
An army now might thunder past, 

And they heed not its roar. 
The starry flag 'neath which they fought 

In many a bloody day, 
From their old graves shall rouse them not. 

For they have passed away. " 

The Government during the Revolution was composed of one 
delegate from each Colony, appointed from time to time, who 
conducted the national affairs till near the close of the war. 
While the Colonies were holding a belligerent attitude toward the 
mother country, a common regard for public safety held them 
firmly together. But the Continent;!] Congress plainly saw that 



18 



when the external pressure should he removed, the Colonies 
would fall apart into separate and independent States. The 
consequences of such an event were as clearly foreseen and as 
fully understood. In order to provide against such dangers, they 
prepared and passed the memorable Articles of Confederation. 
This step was carefully taken and was in the right direction. But 
so keenly jealous was each State of its own rights, and so fearful 
of a consolidated government, that these Articles, though passed 
by Congress in November, 1777, were not finally adopted until 
March, 1781. Whatever hopes may have been awakened by the 
adoption of these Articles, and however great the efforts to do 
that which would prove most for the public good, it was soon 
discovered that the Confederation, even under the Articles as 
finally adopted, was utterly powerless. "By this political 
compact," snid one, " the Continental Congress have exclusive 
power for the following purposes without being able to execute 
one of them : They may make and conclude treaties, but can 
only recommend the observance of them ; they may appoint 
Ambassadors, but they cannot defray even the expenses of their 
tables ; they may borrow money, on their own names on 
the faith of the Union, but they cannot pay a dollar ; 
they may coin money, but they may not import an ounce of 
bullion ; they may make war, and determine what number of 
troops is necessary, but they cannot raise a single soldier ; in 
short, they may declare everything, but they can do nothing." 
" It became evident, therefore, that the Confederation, being 
without resources, and without powers, must soon expire of its 
own debility. It had not only lost all vigor but it had ceased 
even to be respected. It had approached the last stages of its 
decline and the only question which remained was, whether it 
should be left to a silent dissolution or an attempt be made to 
form a more efficient Government before the great interests of 
the Union were buried beneath its ruins." 

A serious crisis had now arrived. The war was indeed over. 
Peace had been proclaimed — liberty and independence had been 
achieved — but the object for which the Nation's treasure and blood 
had been expended was still exposed to defeat. The public 
mind was greatly agitated by the dangers which pointed toward 
either anarchy or despotism. The voices of those who had never 
favored the separation of the Colonies from Great Britain, and 
especially of those who had no faith in popular Government, 
were heard on everv hand, boasting of their own wisdom, and 



19 



predicting disastrous results from the policy and patriotism of 
their countrymen. 

" The signers of the Declaration of Independence themselves 
were the persons who had fallen into the error of believing that 
a Confederacy of independent States would serve as a substitute 
for the repudiated Government of Great Britain. Experience had 
demonstrated their mistake, and the condition of the country 
was a shriek of terror at its awful magnitude. They did retrace 
their steps, not to extinguish the federative feature on which 
their Union had been formed. Nothing could be wider from 
their intention ; but to restore," as we shall see, " the order of 
things conformably to the principles of the Declaration of 
Independence, and as they had been arranged in the first plans 
for a confederation. To make the people of the Union the 
constituent body, and the reservation of the rights of the State 
subordinate to the Constitution, instead of recognizing the 
assumed sovereignty of each separate State as the source of all 
authority." An exigency had arisen which could no longer be 
averted nor postponed. 

At Mt. Vernon, the residence of Washington, this was well 
understood, and there in March, 1785, the first idea of the 
Constitution was started on a proposal to revise the Articles of 
Confederation by an organization of means differing from that of 
a compact between the State Legislatures and their own delegates 
in Congress. An incipient step was thus taken toward the 
formation of the present Constitution of the United States. In 
that year Commissioners were appointed by the Legislatures of 
Maryland and Virginia, to form a compact relative to the 
navigation of the rivers Potomac and Roanoke, and the 
Chesapeake Bay. The Commissioners met accordingly at 
Alexandria, near Mt. Vernon, in Virginia ; but feeling the want 
of adequate powers, they recommended proceedings of a more 
enlarged nature. The Legislature of Virginia, therefore, in 
January, 1786, proposed a convention of Commissioners from all 
the States for the purpose of taking into consideration the state 
of trade, and the propriety of a uniform system of commercial 
relations for their permanent harmony and common interest. 
Pursuant to this proposal, Commissioners were appointed by five 
States, who met at Annapolis in September. 1786. They framed 
a report to be laid before the Continental Congress, advising the 
latter to call a convention of Commissioners from all theStates,to 
meet in Philadelphia in May. 1787, for n //>>>/■<' effectual revision 



20 



of the Articles of Confederation. Congress adopted the recom- 
mendation of the Report, and in February, 1787, passed a resolu- 
tion for assembling a Convention. All. the States except Rhode 
Island, appointed delegates. The delegates met' at Philadelphia. 
General Washington, a delegate from Virginia, was called to 
preside. After very protracted deliberation, extending through 
exactly four months, and amid great diversities of opinion, their 
wise, patient, patriotic labors were concluded. The present ( insti- 
tution of the United States was the result. 

The Preamble of the Constitution reads as follows: " We, 
the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect 
Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for 
the common defense, promote the general welfare and secure the 
blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and 
establish tlds Constitution for the United States of America." 
On September 17th, 1787, this Constitution was laid by the Con- 
vention, before Congress, with the recommendation that it be laid 
by Congress before the several States, to be by them considered 
and ratified in conventions of the representatives of the people 
to be called for that purpose.'' 

The resolutions of the Convention, passed at the close of its 
labors, together with a copy of the proposed Constitution, were 
transmitted by Washington to Congress, accompanied with a 
letter to the President from Washington, which concludes with 
the following language: "In all our deliberations on this 
subject we kept steadily in view that which appears to us the 
greatest interest of every true American — the consolidation of 
our Union— in which is involved our prosperity, felicity, safety, 
perhaps our national existence. This important consideration, 
seriously and deeply impressed on our minds, led each State in 
the Convention to be less rigid on points of inferior magnitude 
than might have been otherwise expected; and thus the Consti- 
tution which we now present is the result of a spirit of amity, 
and of that mutual deference and concession which the peculiarity 
of our political situation rendered indispensible. 

" That it will meet the full and entire approbation of every 
j State, is not, perhaps, to be expected ; but each will doubtless 
consider, that had her interest been alone considered, the conse- 
quences might have been particularly disagreeable or injurious to 
others. That it is liable to as few exceptions as could reasonably 
have been expected, we hope and believe : that it may promote 



21 



the lasting welfare of that country so dear to us all, aud secure 
her freedom and happiness, is our most ardent wish. 

With great respect we have the honor to be, sir, your Excel- 
lency's most obedient, humble servants. 
By unanimous order of the Convention. 

George Washington, 

President.*' 
To His Excellency, 

the President of Congress. 

The Continental Congress promptly carried out the recommen- 
dation of the Convention. In compliance with the action of 
Congress, Conventions were called in all the States except Rhode 
Island, and after many warm discussions, all the States with the 
exception of Rhode Island and North Carolina ratified the Con- 
stitution. Thus from the convulsions of the Revolutionary period, 
and from the not less serious apprehensions of civil discord 
under the Articles of Confederation, emerged the Constitution 
whose history and associations we are now considering. 

The assent of nine States only being required to put the 
Constitution into operation, measures were taken by Congress 
for this purpose in September, 1788, at which time the requisite 
ratifications had been ascertained. 

Accordingly elections were held in the several States, when 
Electors for President and Vice-President were chosen. The 
Electors subsequently assembled and gave their votes. The 
necessary election of Senators and Representatives having 
been made, the first Congress under the Constitution assembled at 
New York, then the seat of Government, on AVednesday^, March 
the 4th, 1789. A quorum, however, of both Houses for the 
transaction of general business did not assemble until the sixth 
of April. At that time the votes of the Electors were counted. 
The result showed that George AVashington had been unani- 
mously elected President, and John Adams Vice-President of the 
United States. On the 30th of April President Washington 
was sworn into office, and the Government went immediately into 
full operation. 

Only eleven States were at first represented, but North 
Carolina afterward, in a Convention held in November, ITS*,*, 
adopted the Constitution, and Rhode Island also, by a Convention 
held in May, 1790. So that all the Thirteen States, by authority 



24 



preceded him" said Mr. Adams, " as a guard of ornament and of 
glory. At his passage over the Schuylkill bridge, a crown of 
unfading laurel was, unconsciously to himself, dropped by a 
blooming boy, from a thickly laurelled arch, upon his head. At 
Trenton he was welcomed by a band of aged matrons commemo- 
rating his noble defense of them, thirteen years before on that 
spot, at the turning tide of the War of Independence — while their 
virgin daughters strewed the path before him with flowers, and, 
chanting a song like that of Miriam, hailed him as their protector, 
who had been the defender of their mothers. A Committee of 
Congress met him on his approach to the Point, where a richly 
ornamented barge of thirteen oars, manned by branch pilots of 
New York, was in waiting to receive him. In this barge he 
embarked. But the bosom of the waters around her, as she 
swept along, was as populous as had been the shores. The garish 
streamers floated upon the gale — songs of enchantment resounded 
from boat to boat, intermingled with the clashing of cymbals, 
with the echoing of horns, with the warbling of the flute, 
and the mellowing tones of the clarionet, weakened, but softened 
as if by distance, by the murmur of the breeze and the measured 
dashing of the waters from the oars, till on reaching New York 
— but let his own diary given by Chief Justice Marshall, 
his biographer, disclose the emotions of his soul amid 
this entrancing scene: 'The display of boats which attended 
and joined on this occasion, some with vocal, and others with 
instrumental music on board, the decorations of the ships, the 
roar of cannon, and the loud acclamations of the people, which 
rent the sky, as I passed along the wharves, filled my mind with 
sensations as painful ( contemplating the reverse of this scene 
which may be the case after all my labors to do good ) as they 
were pleasing.' 

"How delightful it is, on this commemoration of Washington's 
birth,"and nearly the hundredth year since those scenes transpired, 
to reflect that all the fairest visions of hope were to be more 
" than realized, and all the apprehensions of wary prudence and 
self-distrusting wisdom more than dissipated and dispelled." 

Washington opened his Inaugural Address, which was given in 
New York, April 30, 1789, with the following words : " Fellow 
Citizens of the Senate and House of Representatives : Among 
the vicissitudes of life no event could have tilled me with greater 
anxieties than that of which the notification was transmitted by 
your order, and received on the 4th day of the present month. 



25 



On the one hand I was summoned by my country, whose voice I 
can never hear but with veneration and love, from a retreat 
which I had chosen with the fondest predeliction, and, in my 
flattering hopes, with an immutable decision as the assylum of 
my declining years ; a retreat which was rendered every day 
more necessary as well as more dear to me, by the addition of 
habit to inclination, and of frequent interruptions in nry henlth 
by the gradual waste committed on it by time ; on the other 
hand, the magnitude and difficulty of the trust to which the voice 
of my country called me, being sufficient to awaken in the wisest 
and most experienced of her citizens, a distrustful scrutiny into 
his qualifications, could not but overwhelm with despondency one 
who, inheriting inferior endowments from nature, and unpractised 
in the duties of civil administration, ought to be particularly 
conscious of his own deficiencies. In this conflict of emotions, 
all I dare aver is. that it has been my faithful study to collect 
my duty from a just appreciation of every circumstance by which 
it might be affected. AH I dare hope is, that if, in executing 
this task, I have been too much swayed by grateful remembrance 
of former instances, or by an affectionate sensibility to this tran- 
scendent proof of the confidence of my fellow citizens, and have 
thence too little consulted my incapacity, as well as disinclination 
for the weighty and untried cares before me, my error will be 
palliated by the motives which misled me, and its consequences 
be judged by my country, with some share of the partiality in 
which they originated." 

In the conclusion he says : 

" Having thus imparted to you my sentiments, as they have 
been awakened by the occasion which brings us together, I shall 
take my present leave, but not without resorting once more to the 
benign Parent of the human race, in humble supplication, that 
since he has been pleased to favor the Americau people with 
opportunities for deliberating in perfect tranquility, and disposi- 
tions for deciding with unparalleled unanimity, on a form of 
Government for the security of their Union, and the advance- 
ment of their happiness, so his divine blessing may be equally 
conspicuous in the enlarged views, the temperate consultations, 
and the wise measures on which the success of this Government 
must depend." 

During the eight years of the Revolutionary War Washington 
received no compensation, satisfied if Congress would meet the 
expenses necessarily incurred by him in the public service. Of 



26 



these he kept the most exact account. When he undertook the 
duties of the chief magistracy of the country, he gave a further 
evidence of his unselfishness and exalted patriotism. Towards 
the conclusion of his speech to the First Congress, April 30th, 
1789, he says : " When I was first honored with a call into the 
service of my country, then on the eve of an arduous struggle 
for its liherties, the light in which I contemplated my duty re- 
quired that I should renounce every pecuniary consideration. 
From this resolution I have in no instance departed. And 
being still under the impression which produced it, I must 
decline as inapplicable to myself any share in the personal 
emoluments which may be indispensibly included in 
a permanent provision for the executive department ; and must 
accordingly pray that the pecuniary estimates for the station in 
which I am placed may, during my continuation in it, be limited 
to such actual expenditures as the public good may be thought to 
require."" 

Having thus been led by the course of events to the inaugu- 
ration of Washington and the complete establishment under the 
Constitution of the Government of the United States, let us turn 
for a while to the contemplation of Washington himself, anil 
consider as we proceed, some of the elements of his character. 

And in doing this I observe that Washington was possessed 
of great tenderness of heart. This trait is revealed in numerous 
incidents related by his biographers, and in not a few of his 
writings, especially in his appeals to Congress and to the Govern- 
ors of the States in behalf of his suffering soldiers. It was 
conspicuous in his addresses to the soldiers themselves. In- 
deed, so great is the pathos of many portions of his public dis- 
courses and of his private correspondence, that for my own part 
I can rarely read them without being moved to tears. No won- 
der that he w T as beloved by his officers and army ! No wonder 
that he was almost idolized by his countrymen ! Through his 
•sympathies he held the hearts of his fellow men as with hooks of 
steel. 

He had no love for war as such. The news of the cessation 
of hostilities between the King of Great Britain and the United 
States (which was received by Washington at his headquarters at 
Newburgh, N. Y., April 18th, 1783), filled his heart with the 
most pleasing emotions. General orders were immediately issued 
announcing the fact, and directing the proclamation prohibiting 
hostilities to be read at the head of every regiment and corps of 



27 



the army. "After which," adds Washington, " the chaplains, 
with the several brigades, will render thanks to the Almighty 
God for all His mercies, particularly for His overruling the wrath 
. of man to His own glory and causing the rage of war to cease 
among the nations. 

" Although the proclamation above alluded to," he continues, 
" extends only to the prohibition of hostilities, and not to the 
annunciation of a general peace, yet it must afford the most ra- 
tional and sincere satisfaction to every benevolent mind, as it puts 
a period to a long and doubtful contest, stops the effusion of hu- 
man blood, opens the prospect to a more splendid scene, and, like 
another morning star, promises the approach of a brighter day 
than hath hitherto illuminated the western hemisphere. On such 
a happy day, which is the harbinger of peace, a day which com- 
pletes the eighth year of the war, it would be ingratitude not to 
rejoice ; it would be insensibility not to participate in the general 
felicity." 

Washington had ambition. But it was not the ambition o 
Alexander, who, hearing Anaxarchus, the philosopher, speak con- 
cerning the multiplicity of worlds, wept to think that he had not ' 
yet become master of one. Nor was it the ambition of Attila, 
the Hun, whose footsteps were marked with desolation, and who 
proudly called himself "The Scourge of God." Washing- 
tun was ambitious to secure the liberty of his country, to enjoy 
the favor of heaven, and to find a permanent lodgment in the 
esteem and affections of his race. /And this ambition never left 
him. Hence the wonderful spectacle, wonderful because unpre- 
cedented, which he presented to an observing and admiring world 
when he sheathed his sword and returned his commission to the 
American Congress. He might have imitated the example of 
Julius Caesar and converted his popularitj 7 into an instrument for 
his own aggrandizement. He might have taken the path which 
Napoleon subsequently pursued, and by his sword carved 
liis way to a throne. That he was urged to pursue this 
course is matter of record. But never did virtue shrink with 
more instinctive abhorrence from vice, than did Washington from 
the suspicion of being guilty of such a design. With all the 
honesty of a patriot, with all the promptness of a lover of peace, 
he resigned the sword which he had reluctantly taken. 
/ Repairing to Annapolis, where the Congress was at that time 
sitting, Washington signified to that venerable body his desire 
to surrender the commission which he had received from them as 



J 



28 



Commander-in-Chief of the American army. On the 23d of 

\ December, 1782, the impressive ceremony took place in the 

presence of a numerous auditory. The members of Congress 

remained seated and covered. The spectators stood uncovered. 

Washington, on his entrance, was conducted by the Secretary to 

a chair, when after a brief pause the President, General Mifflin, 

informed him that " the United States in Congress assembled 

were prepared to receive his communications." A hush ran 

through the assembly as Washington, with calm dignity, stepped 

forward to perform the last, the most sublime act of his 

whole military life. I cannot forbear quoting the introduction 

and the close of his remarks : /" Mr. President," said he, " the 

fgreat events on which my resignation depended, having taken 

/place, I have now the honor of offering my sincere eongratula- 

]/ 1 tions to Congress, and of presenting myself before them to sur- 

S render into their hands the trust committed to me and to claim 

ithe indulgence of retiring from the service of my country." And 

in conclusion, he adds, "I consider it as an indispensible duty to 

close this hist solemn act of my official life, by commending 

the interests of our dearest country to the protection of Almighty 

God, and those who have the superintendence of it to his holy 

keeping. 

!'• Having now finished the work assigned me, I retire from the 
great theatre of action ; and bidding an affectionate farewell to 
this august body, under whose orders I have long acted, I here 
offer my commission and take mv leave of all the employments 
of public life." 

I need hardly say that this address of Washington was heard 
with emotions too deep for utterance, and that he withdrew with 
the benedictions of Congress, of the country, of heaven, and of 
mankind. Upon the surrender of his military commission he 
withdrew, he hoped forever, from all the scenes of public life. 
His love for retirement was singularly strong, but at the call of 
his country to serve as her chief magistrate he again sacrificed, 
as we have seen, his personal predelietions, and repaired once 
more to the post of duty, ready to serve in a civil, as he had done 
in a military capacity. The period which he devoted to each was 
by a singular coincidence the same. At the close of his Presi- 
dential career, he prepared that wonderful paper, his Farewell 
Address, as the last token of his solicitude for the welfare of his 
country. After pointing out the dangers to which a popular 
< rovernment will ever be exposed and suggesting the best methods 



29 



for averting them, after indicating the duties which the different 
portions of the country would owe to one another, and the whole 
country to foreign nations, he brings his address to a conclusion 
by a modest and affecting reference to himself. " Though in 
reviewing,'' says he, *' the incidents of my administration, I am 
unconscious of intentional error; I am, nevertheless, too sensible 
of my defects not to think it probable I may have committed 
many errors. Whatever they may be, I fervently beseech the 
Almighty to avert or mitigate the evils to which they may tend. 
I shall also carry with me the hope that my country will never 
cease to view them with indulgence; and that after forty-five 
years of my life dedicated to its service, with an upright zeal, the 
fruits of incompetent abilities will be consigned to oblivion, as 
myself must soon be to the mansions of rest." 

Hon. Mr. Gladstone, Prime Minister of the British Govern- 
ment, pays, in the North American Review, for September, 1878, 
discriminating and glowing tribute to the British Constitution, 
and follows it with a tribute, if possible, still more glowing to 
the Constitution of the United States. 

Speaking of the British Constitution he says: " The Cabinet 
and all the present relations of the Constitutional powers in this 
country have grown into their present dimensions, and settled 
into their present places, not as the fruit of a philosophy, not in 
the effort to give effect to an abstract principle ; but by the silent 
action of forces, invisible and insensible, the structure has come 
up into the view of all the world. 

" As the British Consitution is the most subtle organism which 
has proceeded from the womb and the long gestation of progres- 
sive history, so the American Constitution is, so far as I can see, 
the most wonderful work ever struck off at a given time by the 
brain and purpose of man. It has had a century of trial, under 
the pressure of exigencies caused by an expansion unexampled 
in point of rapidity and range : and its exemption from formal 
change, though not entire, has constantly proved the sagacity of 
the constructors and the stubborn strength of the fabric." 

And here I cannot but observe that it will ever be a wonder 
how a man so esteemed and so applauded could have maintained 
the equanimity for which Washington was always distinguished. 
The praise which is now universally accorded to him was not 
altogether withheld in his life time. Nor did the expressions 
of warm regard emanate solely from his own countrymen. His 



30 



character and career had attracted the attention and met the 
approbation of the great and good in other lands. 

In the year 1794, Charles Fox, one of the greatest statesman 
of his own and,perhaps,of any age, in the course of a speech upon 
the attempt of France to embroil the United States in her diffi- 
culties with Great Britain, pronounced in Parliament an euloginm 
upon Washington. Regardless of the fact that scarce twenty 
years before, the subject of his eloquence had been pronounced 
within those very walls, a rebel, he thus breaks forth : " Illus- 
trious man ! deriving honor less from the splendor of his situation 
than from the dignity of his mind; before whom all borrowed 
greatness sinks into insignificance and all the Princes and poten- 
tates of Europe ( excepting the members of our own ' royal ' 
family) become little and contemptible!" "I cannot indeed 
help admiring the wisdom and the fortune of this great man ; 
not that by the phrase fortune I mean in the smallest degree to 
derogate from his merit. But nowithstanding his extraordinary 
talents and exalted integrity, it must be considered as singularly 
fortunate, that he should have experienced a lot, which so seldom 
falls to the portion of humanity and have passed through 
such a variety of scenes, without stain and without reproach. It 
must indeed create astonishment, that placed in circumstances so 
critical and filling for a series of time, a station so conspicuous, 
his character should never once have been called in question ; 
that he should in no one instance have been accused either of 
improper insolence or of mean submission, in his transactions 
with foreign nations. It has been reserved for him to run that 
race of glory, without experiencing the smallest interruption to 
the brilliancy of his career. The breath of censure has not dared 
to impeach the purity of his conduct, nor the eye of envy to raise 
its malignant glance to the elevation of his virtues. Such has 
been the transcendant merit and the unparalleled fate of this 
illustrious man !" 

When the news of the death of Washington reached France, 
his great contemporary, Napoleon, announced the melancholy 
event in an appropriate proclamation to the Government, to his 
army, and to the people, and in token of respect, he ordered 
black crape to be suspended from all the flags and standards 
in the French service, the Chamber of Deputies was dressed 
in mourning, and other marks of public sorrow were exhibited. 



31 



Thus the representative men of the two leading nations of 
the earth paid their homage to the character and memory of 
Washington. 

Nor since that day have the respect and affection of the world 
diminished. On the contrary, with the lapse of time, the virtues of 
Washington shine forth with a brighter lustre. There is no land 
accessible to enlightened enterprise whither his fame has not 
extended. The monument just completed at the national 
metropolis, speaks trumpet-tongued in this behalf, for its impos- 
ing shaft goes up not merely by the additions made from the 
States of the Union which he so largely helped to create, but by 
the marble or granite sent from Switzerland, and Italy, and Greece, 
and from the Islands of the sea. Nor is it an uninteresting fact, 
that towards the close of the year 1860 the heir apparent to the 
British crown, in company with some of England's illustrious 
nobles, visited the tomb of Washington. By this act they signi- 
fied their appreciation of the virtues of the dead, and, may I not 
add, set the seal of their approbation to the cause which he so 
successfully defended. 

But while we speak of Washington in deserved eulogium let 
us not forget that Almighty Being who raised him up, like another 
Joshua, to lead the hosts of our American Israel. Nothing short 
of the divine interposition could have saved our country from the 
perils to which she was exposed. And Joseph, and Moses, and 
Joshua, and David, and Cyrus, were not more certainly ordained 
of heaven to the age and work with which in history they stand 
associated, than was Washington to the stupendous enterprise to 
which he was summoned ; stupendous, I say, for it involved a 
two-fold labor of the greatest difficulty and deepest significance, — 
the achievement of Independence from a nation possessed of the 
greatest military and naval power, and the creation and establish- 
ment of a Popular Government upon the foundation of a written 
Constitution. And God graciously endowed Washington with just 
those qualities of body, mind and spirit, which the exigency of the 
times demanded. And as He raised him up so He kindly protected 
him against the savages of the wilderness, against traitors in his 
own camp, and against the ten thousand dangers incident to a 
bitter and protracted war. God was with him in the Cabinet. 
Nothing less than wisdom imparted from above could have 
guided him in the multiplied, new, and perplexing questions 
which confronted him at every turn during the entire period of 
his civil as well as military life. The difficulties which were 



32 



encountered hy him as President may be inferred from the work 
accomplished. 

"For during the eight years of a turbulent and tempestuous ad- 
ministration, Washington settled upon firm foundations the practical 
execution of the Constitution of the United States. In the 
midst of the most appalling obstacles, through the bitterest 
internal dissentions and the most formidable combi- 
nations of foreign antipathies and cabals, he had subdued 
all opposition to the Constitution itself ; had averted all 
dangers of a European war ; had redeemed American captives 
in Algiers ; had reduced by chastisement and conciliated by kind- 
ness, the hostile of the Indian tribes ; had restored the credit of 
tbe nation ; had provided for the total extinguishment of the 
public debt ; had settled the Union upon the unmovable founda- 
tion of principle, and had drawn around bis head for the admira- 
tion and emulation of after times, a brighter blaze of glory than 
had ever encircled the brows of hero or statesman, patriot or 
sage." * 

Washington was a Christian. He was not ostentatious in his 
piety, but his principles in this regard were fixed. He felt his 
dependence upon God for the accomplishment of the purposes he 
formed, and frequently in the retirement of the forest, as 
at Yalley Forge, was he seen by the passing soldier, in earnest 
prayer, on bended knee, invoking the guidance of Heaven in his 
military plans, the pity of Heaven upon his suffering soldiers, 
and its blessing upon his country then in the throes of revolu- 
tion, struggling to be free. 

"The Revolution itself was a work of thirteen years — and had 
never been completed until the adoption of the Constitution. The 
Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the United 
States are parts of one consistent whole, founded upon one and 
the same theory of government." 

By the Declaration national independence was proclaimed ; by 
the War it was established ; and by the Constitution it was em- 
bodied or consolidated into a distinct nationality. 

" The great measures by which the Revolution was commenced, 
conducted, and concluded, were devised and prosecuted by a very 
few leading minds, animated by one pervading, predominating 
spirit. The object of the Revolution was the transformation of 
thirteen dependent and oppressed English Colonies into one nation 
of thirteen confederated states. It was an undertaking," said 

* .1. Q. Adams. 



33 



Mr. Madison, " to do that which had always before been believed 
impossible. In the progress to its accomplishment, obstacles 
almost numberless, and difficulties apparently unsurmountable, 
obstructed every step of the way. That on the dissolution and 
re-institntion of the social compact, by men marching over an un- 
trodden earth to the very fountains of human Government, great 
and dangerous errors should have been committed, is but an ac- 
knowledgement that the builders of the new edifice were fallible 
men. But at the head of the Convention was George Washing- 
ton, the leader of the Armies of the Revolution — amongst its 
prominent members were Benjamin Franklin and Roger Sherman, 
two of the members of that memorable committee who had re- 
ported the Declaration of Independence — and its other members, 
without exception, were statesmen who had served in the council 
of the Union throughout the Revolutionary struggle, or warriors 
who had contended with the enemy upon the field." 

The framers of the Constitution never claimed for it perfection. 
They left it for time to disclose its defects and to furnish a remedy. 
Accordingly, since its adoption fifteen articles of amendment 
have been passed and become incorporated with it. Twelve 
of these amendments were proposed by the first Congress itself 
in 1789. The remaining three grew out of the recent war for 
the Union. These latter abolish and forever prohibit human 
slavery, and also declare that the right of citizens of the United 
States to vote shall not be denied nor abridged by the United 
States nor by any State on account of race, color, or previous 
condition of servitude. So that by authority of the people of 
the United States, and the favor of God, the Constitution framed 
by our fathers, now stands complete. By it the right of life, 
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, is guaranteed to every 
citizen of the Republic. 

The monument, dedicated to Washington, did not reach its 
completion till all this had been accomplished. Nay, more. 
It was not finished until the war for the Union had vindicated the 
truth blazoned on our national escutcheon, " E Pluribus Unum," 
and shown that the Constitution makes the States a Nation, 

"Distinct like the billows, 
Yet one like the sea." 

Had the result been otherwise, the monument had well re- 
mained incomplete. Had the result been otherwise, well had 
the monument paused midway to its intended height, and stood 



34 



forever and forevermore, pointing with sarcasm and unutterable 
disappointment to the folly which had made shipwreck of a 
matchless Government, blighted the prospects of posterity, and 
hurled back expectant millions, into hopeless servitude all round 
the world. 

The year 1881 completed a century since the Declaration of 
Independence was made good in the close of the military opera- 
tions of the Revolution. Two years hence will complete a century 
since the Constitution was adopted,and three years,a century since, 
in the city of New York, Washington was inaugurated President 
of the United States. We are living in the centennial of great 
events. To the City and State of New York will therefore be 
accorded the honor of leading in 1889 the celebration of the Cen- 
tennial of Peace, of the Adoption of the Constitution, and of the 
Inauguration of Washington. * 

Thus it belonged to our fathers a century ago to set in motion 
influences whose power for good has continually intensified, and 
whose sweep has widened with every successive year. In their de- 
votion to the highest interest of their country and race, they com- 
bined zeal with wisdom. In the cabinet and in the field alike, 
they wrought with only one object in view. They contended for 
that which belonged to them as Englishmen, and which had been 
with difficulty obtained by the sacrifices of many generations. 
Magna Charta was theirs. The Bill of Rights, secured at the 
accession of William and Mary, was theirs. The traditions of the 
past, bearing testimony to England's love of Liberty, w r ere theirs. 
And theirs they resolved they should continue to be; and not 
only theirs, but also their children's, and their children's child- 
ren's. With England they would gladly continue to enjoy these 
privileges if they could ; without her, if they must. Fidelity to 
their high and sacred trust demanded separation. Separation 
came. But true to the spirit and motive which impelled them to 
this course, they embodied in written form the great principles of 
human justice and freedom for which they contended, and by 
common consent and common sacrifice, established as the organic 
law of the Republic, the Constitution under which we live ; a 
Constitution which secures to every citizen in the United States 

* As this Lecture is about to go to press the following appears in the New York Tribune of April 
7th, 1886 : 

NEW YOEK WOULD HAVE THE HONOR. 

Washington, April ".—Representative Phelps, of Xew .Jersey, has received a telegraphic request 
from the New Fork Chamber of I lommerce i" offer us an amendment to the resolution introduced by 
Mr. Butterworth for the appointment of a committee to consider the subject of a celebration in IS5H, 
at Washington, of the centennial anniversary of the formation of the Government under the Constitu- 
tion, "that the celebration shall be held in New York, where the event occurred.' - 



alike, civil and religions privileges snch as render our country at 
this hour the freest and most favored nation upon earth. 

"Thus was achieved," says Judge Story, "another and still 
more glorious triumph in the cause of national liberty than even 
that which separated us from the mother country. By it," he 
adds, "we fondly trust that our Republican institutions will grow 
up and be nurtured into more strength and vigor; our independ- 
ence be secured against foreign usurpation and aggression ; our 
domestic blessings be widely and generally felt ; and our Union, 
as a people, be perpetuated as our truest glory and support, and 
as a proud example of a wise and beneticent government, entitled 
to the respect, if not the admiration of mankind." 

If what Curran, the great Irish orator, said of Britain was 
true of her in his day, nearly a hundred years ago, then we may 
assert, without fear of successful contradiction, that the same 
language is doubly applicable to America in ours. And I now 
claim for America under her matchless Constitution, what Cur- 
ran proudly and justly claimed for Britain : "I speak," said he, 
"in the spirit of British law, which makes liberty commensurate 
with and inseparable from the British soil — which proclaims, 
even to the stranger and the sojourner, the moment he sets his 
foot upon British earth, that the ground on which he treads is 
holy, and consecrated by the genius of Universal Emancipation. 
No matter in what language his doom may have been pro- 
nounced ; no matter what complexion incompatible with freedom, 
an Indian or an African sun may have burnt upon him; no 
matter in what disastrous battle his liberty may have been 
cloven down ; no matter with what solemnities he may have been 
devoted upon the altar of slavery ; the tirst moment he touches 
the sacred soil of Britain the altar and the god sink together in 
the dust ; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty ; his body 
swells beyond the measure of his chains which burst from around 
him, and he stands forth redeemed, regenerated, and disen- 
thralled, by the irresistible genius of Universal Emancipation." 

W e are told that " the Arab of the desert talks of Washington 
in his tent, and that his name is familiar to the wandering Scyth- 
ian." And shall it be that we or our children admiring his char- 
acter, shall ever forget that the cause in which he became illus- 
trious, was the cause of American Liberty ? Shall we, receiving 
at his hands the boon of civil and religious freedom, neglect the 
admonitions which fell from his lips, and refuse to employ the 
means by which alone that freedom can be preserved '. The her- 



36 



eulean labors, the immense sacrifices, which this great national 
fabric cost, should constrain us to say, that in our day at least, 
that fabric shall not fall. Should such a calamity occur at all, 
it would produce universal regret. But should it occur by the 
act or the neglect of American citizens, the maledictions of a 
world would descend upon us. And especially should it take 
place now that the terrible ordeal of civil strife, and war for the 
Union and the Constitution, through which the Republic has 
triumphantly passed are over,then justly and surely should we be 
denounced by the friends of freedom everywhere as having dese- 
crated the altars of human liberty, and plucked down the fairest 
temple ever dedicated to her honor by human hands. In snch an 
event, curses, thicker than the hailstones, and keener than the 
lightning which desolated the land of Egvpt, would descend 
upon us, and we should almost anticipate the day of tinal doom, 
and call upon the rocks and the mountains to cover us, that we 
might disappear forever from the withering glance of a disap- 
pointed world. 

I speak strongly indeed, but not more strongly than I feel. 
I love my country; and it is in her behalf I speak. I love my 
children, and as I look upon them I cannot endure the thought 
that the blessings of the Union, and of free institutions, shall not 
be theirs to inherit. I love my race. With Chremes in Ter- 
rence, I may say : " Homo sum ; humani nihil a me, alienum 
jputoP 

Hence as I look over both hemispheres and survey the teeming 
millions that now inhabit them, and especially when I reflect 
upon the incalculable numbers of coming generations, I cannot 
consent that the experiment of Constitutional Liberty made under 
such unparalleled advantages should ever prove a failure, and 
tyrants thus be furnished with a sarcastic,an irresistible argument 
to wield against the friends of freedom through all future time, 
whenever and wherever they shall presume to lift up their voices 
in the advocacy, and their hands in the defense of human rights. 

In the words of Daniel Webster spoken at a public dinner 
in honor of Washington, and in the City of Washington, Feb. 
22d, 1S32, we may with increased emphasis say : "Other mis- 
fortunes may be borne,or their effects overcome. If disastrous war 
should sweep our commerce from the ocean, another generation 
may renew it ; if it exhaust our treasury, future industry may 
replenish it ; if it desolate and lay waste our fields, still under a 
new cultivation, they will grow green again, and ripen to future 



.;: 



harvests. It were but a trifle even if the walls of yonder Capitol 
were to crumble, if its lofty pillars should fall, and its gorgeous 
decorations be all covered with the dust of the valley. All these 
might be rebuilt. But who shall reconstruct the fabric of demol- 
ished government { Who shall rear again the well proportioned 
columns of constitutional liberty '. Who shall frame together 
the skillful architecture which unites national sovereignty with 
state rights, individual security, and public prosperity '. No, if 
these columns fall, they will he raised not again. Like the Coli- 
seum and the Parthenon, they will be destined to a mournful, a 
melancholy immortality. Bitterer tears, however, will flow over 
them, than were ever shed over the monuments of Roman or 
Grecian art ; for they will be the remnants of a more glorious 
edifice than Greece or Borne ever saw — the edifice of constitu- 
tional American liberty." 

If there was one thing which more than another Washington 
considered as essential under God to the preservation of the na- 
tional liberty, it was the Union of the States. Accordingly in 
his farewell address to his countrymen he says : "The unity of 
government which constitutes you one people is also now dear to 
you. It is justly so ; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real 
independence, the support of your tranquility at home, your peace 
abroad; of your safety ; of your prosperity ; of that very liberty 
which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that 
from different causes and from different quarters, much pains 
will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds 
the conviction of this truth ; as this is the point in the political 
fortress against which the batteries of internal and external 
enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often cov- 
ertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment that you 
should properly estimate the immense value of your national 
union to your collective and individual happii 
that you should cherish a cordial, habitual and immov- 
able attachment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak 
of it as the palladium of your political safety and prosperity : 
watching for its preservation with jealous anxiety; discounten- 
ancing whatever may suggest even a suspicion that it can in any 
event be abandoned ; and indignantly frowning upon the first 
dawning of every attempt to alienate any portion of our country 
from the rest, or to enfeeble the sacred ties which now link to- 
gether the various parts." 

It will be in harmony with the design of this discourse to speak 



38 



of Washington's personal appearance. In the Scripture narra- 
tive respecting Saul chosen to be the ruler of Israel, it is said that 
" there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than 
he : from his shoulders and upward he was taller than any of the 
people. ' "Of Washington's personal appearance," says one who 
evidently drew the picture from life, "little further need be re- 
marked than that it comported entirely with the solid grandeur of 
his character.. In respect to physique, no man could have been bet- 
ter formed for command — a stature somewhat exceeding six feet, a 
full but admirably proportioned frame, calculated to sustain 
fatigue without that heaviness which generally attends great mus- 
cular strength and abates active exertion, displayed bodily power 
of no mean standard. A light and full gray eye, firm forehead, 
a Roman nose; his mouth was peculiar of its class — the lips firm, 
and the under jaw seeming to grasp the upper with force, as if its 
muscles were in full action when he sat still. It was Washing- 
ton's habit to fasten his eyes calmly and steadily upon those who 
were ushered into his presence, whether friend or foe, nor was it a 
slight ordeal to thus meet his penetrating gaze. His limbs were 
long, large and sinewy, and his frame was of equal breadth from 
the shoulders to the hips; his joints were large, as were also his 
feet, and the great size of his hand never failed to attract atten- 
tion. His gait and tread was that of a practiced soldier ; his de- 
portment invariably grave and reserved ; his speech sparing 
and deliberate. At home he wore the usual dress 
of a citizen ; on state occasions he dressed in a full 
suit of the richest black velvet, with diamond knee buckles, and 
square silver buckles set upon shoes japanned with the most 
scrupulous neatness, black silk stockings, his shirt ruffled at the 
breast and wrists, a light dress sword, his hair profusely powdered, 
fully dressed so as to project at the sides and gathered behind in 
a silk bag ornamented with a large rose of black ribbon. In the 
prime of life Washington stood six feet two inches, and weighed 
nearly two hundred and twenty pounds ; he measured precisely 
six feet when attired for the grave '" 

The death of Washington was in keeping with his life. It 
did not find him unprepared. Just before the fatal attack he 
had been making arrangements at Mt. Vernon for an improved 
family tomb. " This change,'" he said to a relative, "I shall 
make the first of all, for I may require it before the rest. I am 
of a short-lived family and cannot expect to remain long upon 
the earth.' 1 What was thus spoken of as possible, turned in a 



39 



short time into a sad reality. On the 12th of December, 
1799, he rode out to his farms, and during his absence encoun- 
tered a cold wind, accompanied with rain, hail and snow. This 
exposure was followed with serious indisposition, which, in the 
end, proved fatal. During his illness he could speak but little. 
To the respectful and affectionate inquiries of an old family 
servant, who, as she smoothed down his pillow, asked how he felt, 
he answered, " I am very ill." Penetrated with gratitude for 
attentions, he often said : " I am afraid 1 shall fatigue you too 
much." And on one occasion added, "Well, it is a debt we must 
pay to each other, and I hope, when you want aid of this kind, 
you will find it." Toward the close of the day on which he 
expired the physician came into the room, and, upon going to the 
bedside, the General said to him : " Doctor, I die hard, but I 
am not afraid to go. I believed, from my first attack, that I 
should not survive it. My breath cannot last long " The doctor 
pressed his hand but could not utter a word. He retired from 
the bedside and sat by the tire absorbed in grief. 

" Between live and six o'clock," says one who was present, 
" Dr. Dick and Dr. Brown came into the room and with Dr. Craik 
went to the bed when Dr. Craik asked the General if 
he could sit up in bed. He held out his hand and 
I raised him up. He then said to the physicians, 
' I feel myself going ; I thank you for your attentions ; but I 
pray you to take no more trouble about me. Let me go off 
quietly. I cannot last long.' After several ineffectual attempts 
to speak, he at length said, 'I am just going. Have me decently 
buried ; and do not let my body be put into the vault in less 
than three days after I am dead.' I bowed assent, for I could 
not speak. He then looked at me again and said, ' Do you 
understand me ? ' ' Yes ' I replied. "T IS WELL,' said he ; the 
last words he ever uttered on earth. With surprising self-posses- 
sion he prepared to die — composing his form at full length, and 
folding his arms on his bosom. About ten minutes before he 
expired ( which was between ten and eleven o'clock on Saturday 
evening) his breathing became easier. He lay quietly; he 
withdrew his hand from mine, and felt of his own pulse. I saw 
his countenance change. 1 spoke to Dr. Craik, who sat. by the 
fire. He came to the bedside. The General's hand fell from 
bis wrist. 1 took it in mine and pressed it to my bosom. Dr. 
Craik put his hand over his eyes, and he expired without a 
struggle or a sigh, December 14th, 1799, in the sixty-eighth year 



40 



of his age, after an illness of twenty-four hours. While we 
were fixed in silent grief, Mrs. Washington, who was sitting at 
the foot of the bed, asked in a firm and collected voice, ' Is he 
gone V I could not speak, but held up my hands as a signal that 
he was no more. ' 'T is well,' said she in the same voice, ' All 
is over now ; I shall soon follow him ; I have no more trials to 
pass through.' " 

The burial took place on Wednesday, December eighteenth. 
The ashes of AVashington now rest in a beautiful inclosure, 
which, in his later years, was selected by himself for a tomb. 

The news of the sudden death of the illustrious patriot soon 
spread throughout his own country and also across the sea, and 
filled every heart with surprise and lamentation. Men of every 
class and clime joined in expressions of lofty, generous, unstinted 
eulogy. 

A truly great man is not envious of the fame of another. " I 
felt on his death," wrote Jefferson of Washington, " that ' verily 
a great man hath fallen this day in Israel.' " 

While Mr. Jefferson was riding, one starry night, with a mem- 
ber of his family, the conversation fell upon Washington. 
Pointing to the stars, he exclaimed ; 

"Washington's fame will go on increasing until the brightest 
constellation in yonder heavens shall be called by his name ! ' 

A bust of Washington stood in the hall at Montieello many 
years after Jefferson's retirement from public life. Some warm 
admirer of his, living in France, sent a wreath of immortelles to 
a member of his family, with the request that it 
might, on his birthday, be placed around Mr. Jefferson's brow. 
The day came, and the relative, informing the venerable man of 
the request, attempted to crown him with the wreath. 

"Place it on Washington's bust," he said, raising his hand to 
prevent the intended honor. It was placed on the bust and rested 
there for many years. 

Said Napoleon : "The measure of Washington's fame is full. 
Posterity will talk of him as the founder of a great empire, 
when my name shall be lost in the vortex of revolutions." 

" I have a large acquaintance among the most valuable and 
exalted classes of men, "wrote Lord Erskine to Washington from 
London ; " but you are the only human being for whom I have 
ever felt an awful reverence." 

Frederick the Great, King of Prussia, in the year 1780, pre- 
sented General Washington with a picture of his majesty taken 



41 



from life. Underneath it were inscribed the words : "From 
the oldest General in Europe, to the greatest General on earth." 

In the funeral oration delivered February, 1800, by the direc- 
tion of Napoleon in his own presence and in that of the great 
dignitaries of the realm, the orator, M. DeFontanes, declared the 
illustrious deceased to be '' a character worthy the best days of 
antiquity." 

To speak of the grief and praises awakened among his own 
countrymen would be vain. A mere catalogue of the demon- 
strations, public and private, would consume more time in its 
perusal than has been devoted to this entire discourse. 

Suffice it to say, as a summary of the whole, Washington, the 
patriot, soldier, statesman, sage, was "First in war, first in 

PEACE, AND FIRST IN THE HEARTS OF HIS COUNTRYMEN." 

Having thus presented the utterances and deeds of some of the 
leading actors in the great drama of the American Revolution, 
having held up the character and work of Washington, the 
illustrious representative of his scarcely less illustrious compat- 
riots, I come now to a reluctant conclusion, and complete the 
design proposed in this discourse by presenting once more to 
your view the result of their combined labors, the matchless 
CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES. And, as I 
have all along preferred to give t< > you in place of my own, the living 
words of men both at home and abroad who were conspicuous in that 
great epoch of human history and since,so now I introduce as a most 
appropriate peroration, the glowing language of Judge Story, 
language with which he closes his masterly Commentary upon the 
American Constitution : " If what I have said shall but inspire 
any here with a more ardent love of their country, an unquench- 
able thirst for liberty, a profound love for the Constitution and 
and the Union, and a fervent gratitude to God, the source of our 
triumphs and prosperity, then it will have accomplished all that 
it ought to desire. 

" Let Americans, and especially American youth, into whose 
hands the power of the country must soon fall, go back to the 
close of the Revolutionary period, and contemplate the feeble- 
ness and incompetency of the Confederation of States then 
existing, and trace the steps by which the intelligence and patriot- 
ism of the great men of that day led the country to the adoption 
of the existing Constitution ; let them never forget that they 
possess a noble inheritance bought by the toils, the sufferings, the 
blood of their ancestors, and capable, if wisely improved and 



42 



faithfully guarded, of transmitting to their latest posterity all the 
substantial blessings of life, the peaceful enjoyment of liberty, 
of religion, and of independence. 

" The structure has been erected by architects of consummate 
skill and fidelity ; its foundations are solid ; its compartments are 
beautiful as well as useful; its arrangements are full of wisdom and 
order, and its defences are impregnable from without. It has been 
reared for immortality, if the work of man may justly aspire to 
such a title. It may nevertheless perish in an hour by the folly 
or corruption, or the negligence of its only keepers — the People. 
Republics are created by the virtue, public spirit and intelligence 
of the citizens. They fall when the wise are banished from the 
public councils because they dare to be honest, and the profligate 
are rewarded because they flatter the people in order to betray 
them/' 



!? 



" Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! 

Sail on, O Union, strong and great ! 

Humanity, with all her fears, 

With all the hopes of future years 

Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 

We know what Master laid thy keel, 

What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel ; 

Who made each mast, and sail, and rope, 

What anvils rang, what hammers beat, 

In what a forge, and what a heat 

Were shaped the anchors of thy hope ! 

Fear not each sudden sound and shock, 

' T is of the wave and not the rock ; 

' T is but the flapping of the sail, 

' T is but a rent made by the gale ! 

In spite of rock and tempest's roar, 

In spite of false lights on the shore, 

Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! 

Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee ; 

Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, 

Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, 

Are all with thee— are all with thee !" 



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